Social institutions may be defined as practices based on
similar principles that display some degree of regularity.
More specifically, a social institution is an interrelated
system of social roles and social norms, organized
around the satisfaction of an important social need or
social function.
Social control is thus simply defined as all the
mechanisms and processes employed by a society to
ensure conformity. In other words, social control is any
cultural or social means by which restraints are imposed
upon individual behavior and by which people are
initiated to follow the traditions and patterns of behavior
accepted by society. It is, simply, a means by which
conformists are rewarded and non-conformists are
punished.